Extras - Novel Adaptation

There was me, and I did murder. But, you would not recognize me in the pictures or newspapers or anywhere, having spent much of life in the care of the white-coats, or what we called the ward doctors at the medic-intellect-center back when the Orchard (what we called the gates of the Jung Clinic) was still operating under old-Samaritan-law. It had gone long well into my fourth cell-year when they began their systematic withdrawal closing of the Orchard gates all across the county, shuffling the rest of their inmates out and out and out, and doing the Bentham-act of granting all-for-one-and-all full pardon to elsewhere; that is, the new med-evacs or something or other as they called them, which was, like, part of this new gov-and-state mandate being legislated everywhere. And perhaps these programs are not too familiar to you either, what with city magistrates changing and unchanging public policy so quickly these days, office terms and elections being shorter, and no one paying too much attention to newspapers and healthcare reform anymore. It was the head medic-man, Dr. Foster and his staff who made their high-recommendation for my transfer into their care at the Upper Nursery (or, domestication reformatories), which was the beginning of my life outside of hospital campus, and what I shall begin my story with.

Well, what it was, if you can remember, were the med-care domestication programs replacing the old institutions, some Ord-Five-Nine-Five-One initiative started by the city after the broadcast of the Jung Institute Tragedy over the video, radio-phone, newspapers and eventually catching the attention of public health committees. Old, old Mayor Mayor called for trauma-audits of all the psych buildings and investigations into the three or so cure-related patient-deaths eventually made all these protests more public. Re-domestication was time consuming even for the high-grads, so they say, and these large grey-and-white-building services were costing everyone a lot of tax money, healthcare benefits and med-care not so well organized anymore. So, following orders from high above, the white-buildings and pharmaceuticals disbanded, and everyone went about on-ways, like, trying to rebuild their practices in private elsewhere. Being one of the special patients in SSC (Special Solitary Confinement), they put me in queue to be among the last going out in those final weeks.

Where they were sending us was to the last of the host-homes (halfway houses) that had just recently opened in the Business-Industrial downtown area of the city near all the bullet-train commute stations, making it one-and-all easier for far-away visitors to come and go, and it would be this place that I would call my new home. My contract was nearing its end by the time the Orchard was shutting down, and barely one fort-night-and-a-half after all the news had spread across the county, there came this very formal and harsh looking letter from high above asking my parents to sign my name over to Dr. Foster and this group of his (I assume, though I really have no idea what it was, even after looking at it). So, with the service being completely sponsored, free of charge, having not much left to lose, and me at the mercy of city reinstitution probate something or other, they signed some papers, and did some boo-hoo-hoo-hoo crying in their parents' grief as they saw the fruit of their labors and only child, will o' wisped away back into temporary special solitary.

In the last closing weeks down F-Ward or F-Row, SSC, the P.A. went off making its daily honking, buzz and ring-ring-ring sound each brunch while my inmates and I spent our morning solitaries in the med-dorms, what the white-coats called their chalky square rooms divided in twos, all decorated with plexi-beds and windows and tables and chairs, like it was all branded by the same great big pharmaceutical firm. The nurses propped up their trays each sunrise with the daily round of vitamins or protein shots while the white-coats made their final rounds checking off some boxes on their clipboards, and bringing in the guardians of each to sign something or other. Then, off they went in opposites, the staff turning the other way, like not wanting much to do with the patients or their families anymore.

"But then, where to? Where to now?" Or other such grievances, like, done with much grieving.

The admin doctors could only just nod and shake and tsk tsk tsk their heads saying, "Out somewhere I suppose. There are new programs available for those qualified." And this was the really sad part of the whole thing. You could imagine most had families out somewhere in the farmlands (outer suburban metros), but a good number were condemned to prolong life sentences, going into their old golden years still daft and dumb and ditched; beyond the help of this world or the next. Then, hauled away, indeed, by a big med-truck to the internment facilities, all of them making these laughing noises and twitching their limbs going heh, heh, heh, life being so horrible and very funny to them, "Oh, good-bye, my fair darling, my farewell darling, good-bye my darling fair. Good-bye, my one true love, my lovely true. Oh sweet, cruel home of my cruel youth."

Those were my neighbors in A-Row through E-Row, taking less than a few fort-nights to clear out, and finally our turn that week. Orders had come from high-above over the weekend, keeping the whole med-staff busy during the Monday Routine, going check, check, check, and then smiling at each of us, pointing their nubs back-ways towards the neon exit. I was in one of the SSC divisions that had their own names and classes and such: F-Row Section-05, Special Solitary Education Observation. I roomed with another like myself, this Bedlam paranoid sort always looking around the corner of her eyes and then off-corner somewhere towards the metallic-grate windows and suction vents whenever she had the chance. She had this very red-haired-like poogley looking hairdo, body a bit bone-slender, and a face-position that was always going left, left, left and right, right right, and then shaking, even today, which was the day of promised freedom for both of us.

"So, where to?" Said she, not to me, but to herself. "Out is where. And today, at long last, freedom!" This sounding really pathetic-like by then, but really making no difference to her, as you could tell with her going about all-out repeating it the whole day like the old Victrola record whirring away over the P.A. during lunch hours. She had records for trouble making in this hall, getting razzled up over nurses and new inmates upon sudden arrival. And then just a week ago at the activity center lobby, there was a loud clang and clash after meal-time hours, one of the female-nurses trying to restrain her for breaking front-ways through the doorway. That, of course, being futile, it being the third time that weekend; they were ready for her, and brought in these big male-nurses with their Winchester pellet guns full of white-serum needles. Then sleep, sleep, sleep, down she went for the entire day, waking up on this noon strapped down in her bed with these rubber-leather cuffs, like truly strapped down to the ankles so that it was near impossible to even move.

But I just sat in bed reading the Daily Bedrock (a psych med-magazine published for the Orchard inmates) they had given me and waited for the next meal or visit. Struggles not necessary, really, nor reasons to make trouble, medic-men these days not really the joking around type as you could imagine. The Orchard had been my misery for many years long. But, I had gotten used to the routine, convinced that neither blood nor spirit kin was I to any of these mindless caged maze-hamsters, and I always did the fast-and-first-act on any opportunities there were to prove my e-plural-bus-unity or something or other they called it, that I was one out of many, like, truly unique and deserving of being somewhere better. There was not much outside of individual conferences with the psych-doctors one-to-one (sometimes one-to-five), but there'd be activities set up for recreation every once in a few weeks, like the red-black-checkers or chess or Othello or the Socrates Symmetrix they had us all play, and even the Ophelia color puzzle with the wooden blocks. When those times came around, I'd always get into it, and like, beating everyone at these games. The white-coats took great notice of me, and that made me feel a bit better about myself.

On weekends, as reward for semi-good behavior, they'd play some bello-canto music on the Victrola over the P.A. Last week, for instance, it was the heavenly ara ara ara from Vincenzo Bellini's Zaira and Beatrice, La Traviata by Verdi, Handel's Holy Sarabande, the H.M.S. of Gilbert and Sullivan, and the opera sophisto of Maria Callas to the Carmen aria where she was singing about love, and lust, and life and going all out, and out, and out, and then gypsy girls doing their star-crossed hypnotics on all the Mendelssohn night-men, like, invading their dreams of Morrigan and Jezebel and Eden. And then, into the evening, it'd slow down to some of the more relaxed new-age music of the times the kids in school were all crazy about: MUTE STEREO, SAM SATURN AND JENNY JUPITER, CLUBS N' SPADES and MOLLY MOSES. On the evening weekends, they'd sometimes treat us with the live vaudevilles from the traveling philharmonica or cirque group passing through and showing off their theatrics, shadow plays, Punch-and-Judy, or even live orchestral music with a real band performance: violins, trombones and super-sopranos going: "Oh! Oh! Oh, L'amour, oh l'amour!" Rossini's Overture of Seville or the Frühlingsstimmen, those being my two favorites. I'd be sitting in the very front-front, doing a cymbal clashing finale, the piccolos going whish and whish and whish again, echoing away into my dreams, like I had a whole orchestra all inside my head.

But they eventually stopped these activities, lack of funds being the main complaint, lack of interest a distant second, and that was a real sad time for me. But my neighbors did not really care one bit, perhaps not even noticing the real triumph of life and music and joy that had disappeared. Well, each one had their own sort of joy, I suppose.

"I shall try to break out again. Tonight, and then the next night. But more carefully this time. The cameras are everywhere." I laughed hearing this, seeing as how she would be kicked out of the Orchard regardless like the rest of us, and, I imagine, in a not-so-pleasant way too.

No doubt about that.

In the next room, I overheard a family of three doing their sympathy-talk with Dr. Gates, the official in charge of the F and G-Ward, a good friend of Dr. Foster, it being easy to tell as the two spoke in Gemini, like, in the same grinning and nodding heh-heh-heh logical manner. He was a grey-haired, old-world intellectual sort, as you'd expect these high-level medic-doctors to be, and very professional about the whole dismissal process that was going on. But he was extra nice to thine truly (that is, me, myself, and none-other-than-I), patient A.M. still being very young, not causing anyone much trouble, and showing much more promise than the others. It was, like, him and his three logistics nurses assisting in the exporting that day

"So, where to today?" said Dr. Gates. "Outside, I suppose. Shall we go for a walk on the grounds?"

"Yes," said Big Ma, "that would be nice, wouldn't it son? We haven't had a good old-fashion family walk for a long time." But their son, too lost, would not speak back.

"But," stopped Big Pa, "I hear that our time is up. Our neighbors back home, you see, they have their son and daughter in an observation ward in the next county, and they've had to recall both back home. I'm afraid," there was silence after his stuttering. "I'm afraid we don't have room at home for our son, nor the financial means at the moment to support him."

"Might there be any other alternative? Another hospital, maybe?"

And they'd be asking more and more questions of this type, kind of futile-like in their own noble way, and not really expecting a good answer, it being obvious even to them that Dr. Gates was just doing the Samaritan-act for the sake of the Hippocratic diplomat oath, or something or other. He yawned, then went about shuffling through some other files, pretending he was clueless and surprised to hear these grievances; 'tis an old song in his ears, truly, and not all very interesting. "Hm? Oh, you never know, you never know. I, certainly, am powerless before these new procedures of the law. Terrible thing, this five-nine-five-one ordinance, at least until the new funding bill passes, let us hope, pray God. My voice, though small, protests this, rest assured. There are some patrons amongst the staff establishing city mandated half-way housing domiciles, but only for their select patients. You'll have to speak with them. Section 8D, Extended Subsidized Rehabilitation Accommodations, I believe it's called."

"You mean," went Big Ma, weeping a bit in her mother's weeping grief. "You mean it's hopeless?"

"Oh no, no, there's hope. We must have hope, must we not? Even when there is none. He's a lucky one to have such caring parents. Others, who will be shipped off to temporary internment at Bentham, are not so lucky. Yes, hope, hope, hope for goodness, for goodness comes from hope, does it not?" Then I could hear him sighing and chicken scratching the paper with his pen, having a good haw-haw-haw to himself about something. "Have you all had lunch yet? How about one last meal together, hm? I hear the chicken soup today is excellent. Times are difficult, indeed. But, chicken soup, saltine snack crackers, whole-wheated bread ... oh, it's great to be alive, is it not, my boy?" And then, Big Pa followed up with his anxious sort of grin, laughing with Dr. Gates, but really much louder to himself.

"Yes, yes, let's do that. Chicken soup would be excellent. Oh, it's certainly been a while since we've had a proper meal as a family. You don't see that sort of thing much these days anymore. Pity, pity." His wife, looking down, nodded uh huh, uh huh, and not saying another word. Well, that was the last I ever heard of them; and whatever became of their son, even now, I know not.

Dr. Gates came in to our room next, finding me well-behaved as always, sitting quiet in my corner like the bell-tower mouse in the fairy-books the other inmates were in the habit of reading, and then glanced over to the other room-side at my struggling inmate. In with him was this wounded nurse lieutenant from the other week, whom I recognized as the victim of the assault, decorated with these white sterilized bandages over her jaw and a neck brace going down to the shoulders. She crept in extra careful-like with the aluminum tin medic-tray in hand.

"Well, well, Alice, how goes the day for you?" All things fair, I thought to myself, turning back to him with a smile, and then going about my daily business of behaving myself. This act, you see, being like a show I put on to all these white-coats and the white-smiths (the R.N. medic assistants) who came in to check up on me. I knew they took badly towards the canaries and stool-chickens in SSC, and opportunity presenting itself, I was eager to show them that I was, like, the very opposite of unhealthy behavior. But you could sort of tell these white-coats (Dr. Gates especially) always quickly caught onto my act, and it always gave them all a good laugh to see me do it.

"And you, my dear. Still plotting, I suppose? A very nasty thing you did earlier this week, terribly nasty. So it's finally happened, eh? I suppose I'll have to sign the papers and make a statement to the authorities now. Well this time, we have it all on camera, everything of you on tape. Yes, yes, indeed, indeed. Harmful intent, alienation of obedience, truthfulness of malice, corpus delictis. Hm? Hm? Hm? Feel free to stop me if I am mistaken?" He went on about it with his hands behind his back in a sort of well, well, well, well, well disposition, walking around her bed, then sat down besides her arm cuffs in the usual doctor fashion, right near her head, yanking a few yarns from her poogley-knit hair and leaning in slyly with this creepy grin and wide-open eyes. And she would be, like, backing away, really afraid that he was going to get in closer. "Discipline, there must be, wouldn't you agree? If not, then there'd only be chaos, and then how could civilized society exist. And more importantly, how could you exist in it? No, no, you must learn to control yourself. Consider, my dear, the consequences of your actions. Consider others who were affected. The nurse you assaulted, for instance, she is still in pain. What shall become of her now? How will she eat? Hm?"

He laughed and sighed, adjusting his glasses and giving this dirty look to the nurse who was looking kind of smug, like real justice had been served nicely. "Dear me, dear me, dear me, what to do, what to do ... Well, you'll be happy to hear that you'll be leaving after all, yes, just as you've always desired, and with our help too. But then, perhaps, considering where you are going, it will be better to be trapped inside than let out, eh? Distasteful, thy freedom shalt scorn thee, eh? Well, you never know, you never know. Nurse?"

With this big fat grin of deep satisfaction, she prepped the medicine-poker full of clear, sour-sterile liquid, and jammed the venom-tipped icepick inwards, like not even giving my cellmate enough time to react to the poison before she went zzzzzzzzzzz away to sleep. Dr. Gates called for some of the bigger male-nurses to prop the entire bedside up-ways vertically onto its wheels, and out they all went except for him. And that was the last I saw of my dear old cellmate of four long years, not even knowing her name; now, no longer struggling, and to be a cellmate no longer. Well then, he turned to me, still nodding and grinning, pulling out the metal click-clack and looking friendlier-like.

"And you as well, Alice, you'll also be leaving here too, but on different terms; on better terms, to be more precise. My good friend Charles has requested you specifically, and I share his recommendation. You've been the most well-behaved of the bunch, and the one to have shown more genuine desire for improvement than the others." And I felt sort of happy and proud hearing this, because you always feel really good when others speak well about you, and say so themselves. Then, with a pat on the shoulders and going, hm, hm, hm, looking to his tick-tock, he got up and looked out the window. "Nice day, isn't it? Perhaps I'll have one of the nurses escort you outside for some fresh air. Your parents will be by shortly tomorrow, and we'll get this whole affair straightened out. On your way, my dear, to a better place, a better world, a brighter future."